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OC Media
01-07-2025
- Politics
- OC Media
Georgians don't want to be ruled by church, despite confidence in religious institutions
Sign in or or Become a member to unlock the audio version of this article Join the voices Aliyev wants to silence. For over eight years, OC Media has worked with fearless journalists from Azerbaijan — some of whom now face decades behind bars — to bring you the stories the regime is afraid will get out. Help us fuel Aliyev's fears — become an OC Media member today Become a member Data from the ISSP 2018 religion survey shows that while Georgians have more confidence in churches and religious organisations than in schools, the business world, the legal system, and parliament, they also largely believe that religious leaders should not try to influence how people vote. In total, very few believe that churches and religious institutions in Georgia should have more power. The relationship between the state and the Georgian Orthodox Church is complicated and contested. While the Georgian government has provided the church with an annual budgetary allocation of millions of dollars, the government has also proposed and passed various measures the church has opposed, ranging from making Orthodoxy the state religion to protections for various minority groups. Within the general populace, two thirds (67%) of Georgians have a great deal of confidence in churches and religious organisations, and 88% have at least some confidence in them. As other CRRC research has consistently shown, people's own religious organisations and the army are the most trusted institutions in Georgia. This pattern appears within the ISSP survey as well, with churches and religious organisations being the most trusted institutions asked about on the survey. As the vast majority of Georgians are Orthodox Christians, the religious institution in question will typically be the Georgian Orthodox Church. However, despite this confidence, 71% of Georgians agree that religious leaders should not try to influence how people vote, compared to 15% who disagree, 9% who neither agree nor disagree, and 4% who were uncertain or refused to answer the question. Additionally, a plurality of Georgians, 42%, think churches and religious institutions have too much power in the country, while only 14% think they have too little power. Slightly over a third (36%) think religious organisations have the right amount, and 8% refused to answer or were uncertain over how to respond to the question. Regression analyses looking at settlement type, sex, age group, education, having a partner or not, and frequency of religious service attendance shows that attitudes vary among different groups towards religious institutions' role in society. For confidence in churches and religious groups, sex, age group, and relationship status were not predictors of attitudes, while settlement type, education level, and religious service attendance were. Advertisement The groups most likely to express a great deal of confidence in churches and religious institutions were people in rural areas, weekly church attendees, and people with a secondary or lower education. Education level similarly predicted responses to whether people believe religious leaders should try to influence voters — people with a higher education were less likely to agree that religious leaders should try to influence votes. Sex and relationship status were also correlated: women and those without partners were more likely to say that religious leaders should not influence voting. Settlement type, age group, and frequency of religious service attendance did not predict attitudes. Unlike the previous two questions, education level was not predictive of views on whether or not churches and religious organisations had too much or too little power in society. Settlement type, sex, and relationship status were likewise uncorrelated. Age and frequency of religious service attendance, on the other hand, were predictive. People who never or very rarely attended religious services were most likely to say that churches and religious institutions had too much power. Similarly, young people (18–34) were more likely to believe religious institutions have too much power. Notably, people who attended religious services monthly were actually more likely than those who attended weekly to think churches and religious institutions should have more power — 20% compared to 15%. Despite their general favourability toward the church and religious institutions, Georgians do not think these institutions should have more power or that their leaders should try to influence voters. The data used in this article is available here. The regression analysis used in this article included the following variables: settlement type (capital, other urban, rural), age (18-34, 35-55, 55+), sex (male or female), education (secondary or lower, secondary technical, or higher than secondary), employment status (employed or unemployed), relationship status (has a spouse or partner, does not have a spouse or partner), and frequency of attendance of religious services (never or less than once per year, at least once per year, at least once per month, at least once per week). This article was written by Teimuraz Kobakhidze, a junior researcher, and Katharine Khamhaengwong, an international fellow, at CRRC Georgia. The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC Georgia or its affiliates.
Los Angeles Times
26-06-2025
- General
- Los Angeles Times
Alaska Native woman, ‘everybody's helper,' is Orthodox church's first female North American saint
KWETHLUK, Alaska — It was in the dusty streets and modest homes of this remote Alaska Native village that Olga Michael quietly lived her entire life as a midwife and a mother of 13. As the wife of an Orthodox Christian priest, she was a 'matushka,' or spiritual mother to many more. The Yup'ik woman became known in church communities across Alaska for quiet generosity, piety and compassion — particularly as a consoler of women who had suffered from abuse, from miscarriage, from the most intimate of traumas. She could share from her own grief, having lost five children who didn't live to adulthood. Her renown spread to a widening circle of devotees after her death from cancer in 1979 at age 63 — through word of mouth and reports of her appearance in sacred dreams and visions, even among people far from Alaska. Now, after an elaborate ceremony in her village of about 800 people in southwestern Alaska, she is the first female Orthodox saint from North America, officially known as 'St. Olga of Kwethluk, Matushka of All Alaska.' 'I only thought of her as my mom,' said her daughter, Helen Larson, who attended the ritual June 19 along with St. Olga's other surviving children and many of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She is in awe of her mother's wide impact. 'This is not just my mom anymore,' Larson said. St. Olga is 'everybody's helper.' For a church led exclusively by male bishops and priests, the glorification of Olga, the first Yup'ik saint, is significant. 'The church is often seen as a hierarchical, patriarchal institution,' said Metropolitan Tikhon, head of the Orthodox Church in America. 'Recognizing women like St. Olga is a reminder that the same path of holiness is available to all. Male or female, young or old, rich or poor, everyone is called to follow the same commandments.' St. Olga's sainthood is especially meaningful because many women canonized by the church have been ancient martyrs or nuns, said Carrie Frederick Frost, a professor of religion and culture at Western Washington University who studies women and Orthodoxy. 'To come here and be a part of the glorification of a woman who was a lay woman and was a mother and a grandmother and lived a life that many women have lived, it's just incredibly appealing,' Frost said. St. Olga's appeal to those who have suffered abuse or miscarriage is also important, she said: 'I think the church has largely failed to minister to those situations, not entirely but largely.' There are several female Catholic saints from North America. They include St. Kateri Tekakwitha, a 17th century Mohawk Algonquin woman canonized in 2012. Hundreds of visitors from near and far converged for her canonization — or 'glorification' in Orthodox terminology. 'Thou art the glory of the Yup'ik people … a new North Star in the firmament of Christ's holy Church,' the choir sang. The ceremonies were replete with ringing bells, robust hymns and processions of black-robed clerics, golden-robed acolytes, women in headscarves and other devotees in a mingling of dust and incense. Some worshippers arrived for the glorification from nearby Yup'ik villages. Others flew in from faraway states and countries to the regional hub of Bethel, and then rode in a fleet of motorboats some 17 miles up the broad Kuskokwim River — a watershed central to the traditional Yup'ik subsistence lifestyle, marked by yearly rhythms of fishing, hunting and gathering. Hundreds gathered at a riverbank in Kwethluk to greet Metropolitan Tikhon and other bishops at a specially made dock. Choral chants and incense began rising after they disembarked, and continued for hours in the uncharacteristically hot sun of Alaska's long solstice eve. About 150 devotees squeezed into the sanctuary of Saint Nicholas Orthodox Church, whose golden onion domes rise above the village's modest one-story homes. Others listened outside as a choir sang hymns in Yup'ik, many of them composed for the occasion: 'Nanraramteggen elpet, tanqilria atauwaulria cali Aanaput Arrsamquq, cali nanrararput tanqilria yuucin elpet,' said one. ('We magnify thee, O holy and righteous mother Olga, and we honor thy holy memory.') Prayers honored St. Olga as 'the healer of those who suffered abuse and tragedy, the mother of children separated from their parents, the swift aid of women in hard labor, the comfort of all those wounded in heart and soul.' Worshippers approached her open casket after the ceremony, crossing themselves and kneeling. Wiz Ruppert of Cranston, R.I., returned to her native Kwethluk for the ceremony. That the grandmother she lived with for much of her childhood is now a saint seemed strange at first, 'but then it was also very fitting, because she was also so kind and generous when she was alive.' And Larson, one of St. Olga's daughters, recalled watching women, and some men, seek her mother's counsel. She didn't eavesdrop, but 'I used to read their faces,' Larson said. 'They'd feel heavy, by their facial expression, their body language,' Larson said. 'Then they'd have tea or coffee and talk, and by the time they go out, they're much lighter and happier.' St. Olga joins a growing cadre of saints with strong ties to Alaska — widely deemed an Orthodox holy land, even though only a fraction of the state's population are adherents. It's here that Orthodoxy — the world's second-largest Christian communion — gained a foothold in the present-day United States with the 18th and 19th century arrival of Russian Orthodox missionaries to what was then czarist territory. Several Orthodox monks and martyrs with ties to Alaska have already been canonized in the Orthodox Church in America, the now-independent offspring of the Russian Orthodox Church. St. Olga is the third with Alaska Native heritage, emblematic of how the faith has grafted in with some Indigenous cultures. Most of the state's Orthodox priests, serving about 80 parishes, are Alaska Natives. More than a dozen are from Kwethluk. In November 2024, priests exhumed Olga's body. Her remains are currently kept in an open casket in Kwethluk's church, where pilgrims can venerate her shrouded relics. When the bishops of the Orthodox Church in America authorized St. Olga's canonization in 2023, there was talk of moving her body to Anchorage as a more accessible location. But bishops answered the pleas of village residents, who didn't want to lose the presence of their spiritual mother. Now Kwethluk, inaccessible by roads, will become one of the American church's most remote pilgrimage destinations. The diocese is working with the village on plans for a new church, hospitality center and cultural center. The village provided a taste of such hospitality for the glorification. Pilgrims stayed in a local school or in residents' homes — amply fed by home-prepared meals of Alaska specialties such as walrus meat and smoked fish. Nicholai Joekay of nearby Bethel — who is named for St. Olga's late husband and grew up attending church events with her family — was deeply moved by the glorification. 'In church, up until today, we sang hymns of saints and holy people from foreign lands,' he said in a written reflection shared with the Associated Press. 'We have had to learn foreign concepts that are mentioned in the Gospels referencing agricultural terms and concepts from cultures that are difficult for us to understand. 'Today, we sang hymns of a pious Yup'ik woman who lived a life that we can relate to with words that only we can pronounce properly,' he wrote. 'Today,' he added, 'God was closer to all of us.' Smith writes for the Associated Press. AP video journalist Mark Thiessen contributed to this report.
San Francisco Chronicle
26-06-2025
- General
- San Francisco Chronicle
Alaska Native woman, 'everybody's helper,' is Orthodox church's first female North American saint
KWETHLUK, Alaska (AP) — It was in the dusty streets and modest homes of this remote Alaska Native village that Olga Michael quietly lived her entire life as a midwife and a mother of 13. As the wife of an Orthodox Christian priest, she was a 'matushka,' or spiritual mother to many more. The Yup'ik woman became known in church communities across Alaska for quiet generosity, piety and compassion — particularly as a consoler of women who had suffered from abuse, from miscarriage, from the most intimate of traumas. She could share from her own grief, having lost five children who didn't live to adulthood. Her renown spread to a widening circle of devotees after her death from cancer in 1979 at age 63 — through word of mouth and reports of her appearance in sacred dreams and visions, even among people far from Alaska. Now, after an elaborate ceremony in her village of about 800 people in southwestern Alaska, she is the first female Orthodox saint from North America, officially known as 'St. Olga of Kwethluk, Matushka of All Alaska.' 'I only thought of her as my mom,' said her daughter, Helen Larson, who attended the ritual last Thursday along with St. Olga's other surviving children and many of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She is in awe of her mother's wide impact. 'This is not just my mom anymore,' Larson said. St. Olga is 'everybody's helper.' Why Olga's gender and ethnicity matter For a church led exclusively by male bishops and priests, the glorification of Olga, the first Yup'ik saint, is significant. 'The church is often seen as a hierarchical, patriarchal institution,' said Metropolitan Tikhon, head of the Orthodox Church in America. 'Recognizing women like St. Olga is a reminder that the same path of holiness is available to all. Male or female, young or old, rich or poor, everyone is called to follow the same commandments.' St. Olga's sainthood is especially meaningful because many women canonized by the church have been ancient martyrs or nuns, said Carrie Frederick Frost, a professor of religion and culture at Western Washington University who studies women and Orthodoxy. 'To come here and be a part of the glorification of a woman who was a lay woman and was a mother and a grandmother and lived a life that many women have lived, it's just incredibly appealing,' Frost said. St. Olga's appeal to those who have suffered abuse or miscarriage is also important, she said: 'I think the church has largely failed to minister to those situations, not entirely but largely.' There are several female Catholic saints from North America. They include St. Kateri Tekakwitha, a 17th century Mohawk-Algonquin woman canonized in 2012. An elaborate canonization ceremony Hundreds of visitors from near and far converged for her canonization — or 'glorification' in Orthodox terminology. 'Thou art the glory of the Yup'ik people … a new North Star in the firmament of Christ's holy Church,' the choir sang. The ceremonies were replete with ringing bells, robust hymns and processions of black-robed clerics, golden-robed acolytes, women in headscarves and other devotees in a mingling of dust and incense. Some worshippers arrived for the glorification from nearby Yup'ik villages. Others flew in from faraway states and countries to the regional hub of Bethel, and then rode in a fleet of motorboats some 17 miles up the broad Kuskokwim River — a watershed central to the traditional Yup'ik subsistence lifestyle, marked by yearly rhythms of fishing, hunting and gathering. Hundreds gathered at a riverbank in Kwethluk to greet Metropolitan Tikhon and other bishops at a specially made dock. Choral chants and incense began rising after they disembarked, and continued for hours in the uncharacteristically hot sun of Alaska's long solstice eve. About 150 devotees squeezed into the sanctuary of Saint Nicholas Orthodox Church, whose golden onion domes rise above the village's modest one-story homes. Others listened outside as a choir sang hymns in Yup'ik, many of them composed for the occasion: 'Nanraramteggen elpet, tanqilria atauwaulria cali Aanaput Arrsamquq, cali nanrararput tanqilria yuucin elpet,' said one. ('We magnify thee, O holy and righteous mother Olga, and we honor thy holy memory.') Prayers honored St. Olga as 'the healer of those who suffered abuse and tragedy, the mother of children separated from their parents, the swift aid of women in hard labor, the comfort of all those wounded in heart and soul.' Worshippers approached her open casket after the ceremony, crossing themselves and kneeling. A family's recollections Wiz Ruppert of Cranston, Rhode Island, returned to her native Kwethluk for the ceremony. That the grandmother she lived with for much of her childhood is now a saint seemed strange at first, 'but then it was also very fitting, because she was also so kind and generous when she was alive.' And Larson, one of St. Olga's daughters, recalled watching women, and some men, seek her mother's counsel. She didn't eavesdrop, but 'I used to read their faces,' Larson said. 'They'd feel heavy, by their facial expression, their body language,' Larson said. 'Then they'd have tea or coffee and talk, and by the time they go out, they're much lighter and happier.' What is Orthodoxy's link with Alaska? St. Olga joins a growing cadre of saints with strong ties to Alaska — widely deemed an Orthodox holy land, even though only a fraction of the state's population are adherents. It's here that Orthodoxy — the world's second-largest Christian communion — gained a foothold in the present-day United States with the 18th and 19th century arrival of Russian Orthodox missionaries to what was then czarist territory. Several Orthodox monks and martyrs with ties to Alaska have already been canonized in the Orthodox Church in America, the now-independent offspring of the Russian Orthodox Church. St. Olga is the third with Alaska Native heritage, emblematic of how the faith has grafted in with some Indigenous cultures. Most of the state's Orthodox priests, serving about 80 parishes, are Alaska Natives. More than a dozen are from Kwethluk. A debate, now resolved, over Olga's remains In November 2024, priests exhumed Olga's body. Her remains are currently kept in an open casket in Kwethluk's church, where pilgrims can venerate her shrouded relics. When the bishops of the Orthodox Church in America authorized St. Olga's canonization in 2023, there was talk of moving her body to Anchorage as a more accessible location. But bishops answered the pleas of village residents, who didn't want to lose the presence of their spiritual mother. Now Kwethluk, inaccessible by roads, will become one of the American church's most remote pilgrimage destinations. The diocese is working with the village on plans for a new church, hospitality center and cultural center. Worshipping in your own language The village provided a taste of such hospitality for the glorification. Pilgrims stayed in a local school or in residents' homes — amply fed by home-prepared meals of Alaska specialties such as walrus meat and smoked fish. Nicholai Joekay of nearby Bethel — who is named for St. Olga's late husband and grew up attending church events with her family — was deeply moved by the glorification. 'In church, up until today, we sang hymns of saints and holy people from foreign lands,' he said in a written reflection shared with The Associated Press. 'We have had to learn foreign concepts that are mentioned in the Gospels referencing agricultural terms and concepts from cultures that are difficult for us to understand. 'Today, we sang hymns of a pious Yup'ik woman who lived a life that we can relate to with words that only we can pronounce properly,' he wrote. 'Today,' he added, 'God was closer to all of us.' ___
Winnipeg Free Press
26-06-2025
- General
- Winnipeg Free Press
Alaska Native woman, ‘everybody's helper,' is Orthodox church's first female North American saint
KWETHLUK, Alaska (AP) — It was in the dusty streets and modest homes of this remote Alaska Native village that Olga Michael quietly lived her entire life as a midwife and a mother of 13. As the wife of an Orthodox Christian priest, she was a 'matushka,' or spiritual mother to many more. The Yup'ik woman became known in church communities across Alaska for quiet generosity, piety and compassion — particularly as a consoler of women who had suffered from abuse, from miscarriage, from the most intimate of traumas. She could share from her own grief, having lost five children who didn't live to adulthood. Her renown spread to a widening circle of devotees after her death from cancer in 1979 at age 63 — through word of mouth and reports of her appearance in sacred dreams and visions, even among people far from Alaska. Now, after an elaborate ceremony in her village of about 800 people in southwestern Alaska, she is the first female Orthodox saint from North America, officially known as 'St. Olga of Kwethluk, Matushka of All Alaska.' 'I only thought of her as my mom,' said her daughter, Helen Larson, who attended the ritual last Thursday along with St. Olga's other surviving children and many of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She is in awe of her mother's wide impact. 'This is not just my mom anymore,' Larson said. St. Olga is 'everybody's helper.' Why Olga's gender and ethnicity matter For a church led exclusively by male bishops and priests, the glorification of Olga, the first Yup'ik saint, is significant. 'The church is often seen as a hierarchical, patriarchal institution,' said Metropolitan Tikhon, head of the Orthodox Church in America. 'Recognizing women like St. Olga is a reminder that the same path of holiness is available to all. Male or female, young or old, rich or poor, everyone is called to follow the same commandments.' St. Olga's sainthood is especially meaningful because many women canonized by the church have been ancient martyrs or nuns, said Carrie Frederick Frost, a professor of religion and culture at Western Washington University who studies women and Orthodoxy. 'To come here and be a part of the glorification of a woman who was a lay woman and was a mother and a grandmother and lived a life that many women have lived, it's just incredibly appealing,' Frost said. St. Olga's appeal to those who have suffered abuse or miscarriage is also important, she said: 'I think the church has largely failed to minister to those situations, not entirely but largely.' There are several female Catholic saints from North America. They include St. Kateri Tekakwitha, a 17th century Mohawk-Algonquin woman canonized in 2012. An elaborate canonization ceremony Hundreds of visitors from near and far converged for her canonization — or 'glorification' in Orthodox terminology. 'Thou art the glory of the Yup'ik people … a new North Star in the firmament of Christ's holy Church,' the choir sang. The ceremonies were replete with ringing bells, robust hymns and processions of black-robed clerics, golden-robed acolytes, women in headscarves and other devotees in a mingling of dust and incense. Some worshippers arrived for the glorification from nearby Yup'ik villages. Others flew in from faraway states and countries to the regional hub of Bethel, and then rode in a fleet of motorboats some 17 miles up the broad Kuskokwim River — a watershed central to the traditional Yup'ik subsistence lifestyle, marked by yearly rhythms of fishing, hunting and gathering. Hundreds gathered at a riverbank in Kwethluk to greet Metropolitan Tikhon and other bishops at a specially made dock. Choral chants and incense began rising after they disembarked, and continued for hours in the uncharacteristically hot sun of Alaska's long solstice eve. About 150 devotees squeezed into the sanctuary of Saint Nicholas Orthodox Church, whose golden onion domes rise above the village's modest one-story homes. Others listened outside as a choir sang hymns in Yup'ik, many of them composed for the occasion: 'Nanraramteggen elpet, tanqilria atauwaulria cali Aanaput Arrsamquq, cali nanrararput tanqilria yuucin elpet,' said one. ('We magnify thee, O holy and righteous mother Olga, and we honor thy holy memory.') Prayers honored St. Olga as 'the healer of those who suffered abuse and tragedy, the mother of children separated from their parents, the swift aid of women in hard labor, the comfort of all those wounded in heart and soul.' Worshippers approached her open casket after the ceremony, crossing themselves and kneeling. A family's recollections Wiz Ruppert of Cranston, Rhode Island, returned to her native Kwethluk for the ceremony. That the grandmother she lived with for much of her childhood is now a saint seemed strange at first, 'but then it was also very fitting, because she was also so kind and generous when she was alive.' And Larson, one of St. Olga's daughters, recalled watching women, and some men, seek her mother's counsel. She didn't eavesdrop, but 'I used to read their faces,' Larson said. 'They'd feel heavy, by their facial expression, their body language,' Larson said. 'Then they'd have tea or coffee and talk, and by the time they go out, they're much lighter and happier.' What is Orthodoxy's link with Alaska? St. Olga joins a growing cadre of saints with strong ties to Alaska — widely deemed an Orthodox holy land, even though only a fraction of the state's population are adherents. It's here that Orthodoxy — the world's second-largest Christian communion — gained a foothold in the present-day United States with the 18th and 19th century arrival of Russian Orthodox missionaries to what was then czarist territory. Several Orthodox monks and martyrs with ties to Alaska have already been canonized in the Orthodox Church in America, the now-independent offspring of the Russian Orthodox Church. St. Olga is the third with Alaska Native heritage, emblematic of how the faith has grafted in with some Indigenous cultures. Most of the state's Orthodox priests, serving about 80 parishes, are Alaska Natives. More than a dozen are from Kwethluk. A debate, now resolved, over Olga's remains In November 2024, priests exhumed Olga's body. Her remains are currently kept in an open casket in Kwethluk's church, where pilgrims can venerate her shrouded relics. When the bishops of the Orthodox Church in America authorized St. Olga's canonization in 2023, there was talk of moving her body to Anchorage as a more accessible location. But bishops answered the pleas of village residents, who didn't want to lose the presence of their spiritual mother. Now Kwethluk, inaccessible by roads, will become one of the American church's most remote pilgrimage destinations. The diocese is working with the village on plans for a new church, hospitality center and cultural center. Worshipping in your own language The village provided a taste of such hospitality for the glorification. Pilgrims stayed in a local school or in residents' homes — amply fed by home-prepared meals of Alaska specialties such as walrus meat and smoked fish. Nicholai Joekay of nearby Bethel — who is named for St. Olga's late husband and grew up attending church events with her family — was deeply moved by the glorification. 'In church, up until today, we sang hymns of saints and holy people from foreign lands,' he said in a written reflection shared with The Associated Press. 'We have had to learn foreign concepts that are mentioned in the Gospels referencing agricultural terms and concepts from cultures that are difficult for us to understand. 'Today, we sang hymns of a pious Yup'ik woman who lived a life that we can relate to with words that only we can pronounce properly,' he wrote. 'Today,' he added, 'God was closer to all of us.' ___ AP video journalist Mark Thiessen contributed. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
The Independent
26-06-2025
- General
- The Independent
Alaska Native woman, 'everybody's helper,' is Orthodox church's first female North American saint
It was in the dusty streets and modest homes of this remote Alaska Native village that Olga Michael quietly lived her entire life as a midwife and a mother of 13. As the wife of an Orthodox Christian priest, she was a 'matushka,' or spiritual mother to many more. The Yup'ik woman became known in church communities across Alaska for quiet generosity, piety and compassion — particularly as a consoler of women who had suffered from abuse, from miscarriage, from the most intimate of traumas. She could share from her own grief, having lost five children who didn't live to adulthood. Her renown spread to a widening circle of devotees after her death from cancer in 1979 at age 63 — through word of mouth and reports of her appearance in sacred dreams and visions, even among people far from Alaska. Now, after an elaborate ceremony in her village of about 800 people in southwestern Alaska, she is the first female Orthodox saint from North America, officially known as 'St. Olga of Kwethluk, Matushka of All Alaska.' 'I only thought of her as my mom,' said her daughter, Helen Larson, who attended the ritual last Thursday along with St. Olga's other surviving children and many of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She is in awe of her mother's wide impact. 'This is not just my mom anymore,' Larson said. St. Olga is 'everybody's helper.' Why Olga's gender and ethnicity matter For a church led exclusively by male bishops and priests, the glorification of Olga, the first Yup'ik saint, is significant. 'The church is often seen as a hierarchical, patriarchal institution,' said Metropolitan Tikhon, head of the Orthodox Church in America. 'Recognizing women like St. Olga is a reminder that the same path of holiness is available to all. Male or female, young or old, rich or poor, everyone is called to follow the same commandments.' St. Olga's sainthood is especially meaningful because many women canonized by the church have been ancient martyrs or nuns, said Carrie Frederick Frost, a professor of religion and culture at Western Washington University who studies women and Orthodoxy. 'To come here and be a part of the glorification of a woman who was a lay woman and was a mother and a grandmother and lived a life that many women have lived, it's just incredibly appealing,' Frost said. St. Olga's appeal to those who have suffered abuse or miscarriage is also important, she said: 'I think the church has largely failed to minister to those situations, not entirely but largely.' There are several female Catholic saints from North America. They include St. Kateri Tekakwitha, a 17th century Mohawk-Algonquin woman canonized in 2012. An elaborate canonization ceremony Hundreds of visitors from near and far converged for her canonization — or 'glorification' in Orthodox terminology. 'Thou art the glory of the Yup'ik people … a new North Star in the firmament of Christ's holy Church,' the choir sang. The ceremonies were replete with ringing bells, robust hymns and processions of black-robed clerics, golden-robed acolytes, women in headscarves and other devotees in a mingling of dust and incense. Some worshippers arrived for the glorification from nearby Yup'ik villages. Others flew in from faraway states and countries to the regional hub of Bethel, and then rode in a fleet of motorboats some 17 miles up the broad Kuskokwim River — a watershed central to the traditional Yup'ik subsistence lifestyle, marked by yearly rhythms of fishing, hunting and gathering. Hundreds gathered at a riverbank in Kwethluk to greet Metropolitan Tikhon and other bishops at a specially made dock. Choral chants and incense began rising after they disembarked, and continued for hours in the uncharacteristically hot sun of Alaska's long solstice eve. About 150 devotees squeezed into the sanctuary of Saint Nicholas Orthodox Church, whose golden onion domes rise above the village's modest one-story homes. Others listened outside as a choir sang hymns in Yup'ik, many of them composed for the occasion: 'Nanraramteggen elpet, tanqilria atauwaulria cali Aanaput Arrsamquq, cali nanrararput tanqilria yuucin elpet,' said one. ('We magnify thee, O holy and righteous mother Olga, and we honor thy holy memory.') Prayers honored St. Olga as 'the healer of those who suffered abuse and tragedy, the mother of children separated from their parents, the swift aid of women in hard labor, the comfort of all those wounded in heart and soul.' Worshippers approached her open casket after the ceremony, crossing themselves and kneeling. A family's recollections Wiz Ruppert of Cranston, Rhode Island, returned to her native Kwethluk for the ceremony. That the grandmother she lived with for much of her childhood is now a saint seemed strange at first, 'but then it was also very fitting, because she was also so kind and generous when she was alive.' And Larson, one of St. Olga's daughters, recalled watching women, and some men, seek her mother's counsel. She didn't eavesdrop, but 'I used to read their faces,' Larson said. 'They'd feel heavy, by their facial expression, their body language,' Larson said. 'Then they'd have tea or coffee and talk, and by the time they go out, they're much lighter and happier.' What is Orthodoxy's link with Alaska? St. Olga joins a growing cadre of saints with strong ties to Alaska — widely deemed an Orthodox holy land, even though only a fraction of the state's population are adherents. It's here that Orthodoxy — the world's second-largest Christian communion — gained a foothold in the present-day United States with the 18th and 19th century arrival of Russian Orthodox missionaries to what was then czarist territory. Several Orthodox monks and martyrs with ties to Alaska have already been canonized in the Orthodox Church in America, the now-independent offspring of the Russian Orthodox Church. St. Olga is the third with Alaska Native heritage, emblematic of how the faith has grafted in with some Indigenous cultures. Most of the state's Orthodox priests, serving about 80 parishes, are Alaska Natives. More than a dozen are from Kwethluk. A debate, now resolved, over Olga's remains In November 2024, priests exhumed Olga's body. Her remains are currently kept in an open casket in Kwethluk's church, where pilgrims can venerate her shrouded relics. When the bishops of the Orthodox Church in America authorized St. Olga's canonization in 2023, there was talk of moving her body to Anchorage as a more accessible location. But bishops answered the pleas of village residents, who didn't want to lose the presence of their spiritual mother. Now Kwethluk, inaccessible by roads, will become one of the American church's most remote pilgrimage destinations. The diocese is working with the village on plans for a new church, hospitality center and cultural center. Worshipping in your own language The village provided a taste of such hospitality for the glorification. Pilgrims stayed in a local school or in residents' homes — amply fed by home-prepared meals of Alaska specialties such as walrus meat and smoked fish. Nicholai Joekay of nearby Bethel — who is named for St. Olga's late husband and grew up attending church events with her family — was deeply moved by the glorification. 'In church, up until today, we sang hymns of saints and holy people from foreign lands,' he said in a written reflection shared with The Associated Press. 'We have had to learn foreign concepts that are mentioned in the Gospels referencing agricultural terms and concepts from cultures that are difficult for us to understand. 'Today, we sang hymns of a pious Yup'ik woman who lived a life that we can relate to with words that only we can pronounce properly,' he wrote. 'Today,' he added, 'God was closer to all of us.' ___ AP video journalist Mark Thiessen contributed. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
